- about us
- how we work
Culture at Körber
Since 2020, Körber has united more than 40 formerly individual brands under the Körber brand. Such a comprehensive transformation entails challenges – in particular the creation of a joint culture across all Business Areas and locations. To get closer to this goal, we launched an ambitious culture project in 2022.
Culture can be summarized as a set of values, norms and ways of thinking that shape the behavior of employees at all levels and in different areas. A clear, supportive culture is of central importance to Körber in order to sustainably strengthen both the company's success and our brand personality.
As part of our culture project, we at Körber have defined two core values: trust and collaboration. These serve as the basis for a wide range of activities aimed at actively shaping our corporate culture. Our aim is to create a shared understanding – across all Business Areas and locations – and thus successfully achieve our business goals. The project is based on a bottom-up approach and invites all employees to play an active role in shaping our cultural change.
#strongertogether
Would you like to play an active role in shaping the culture at Körber?
Here you can find our global job offers.
"Culture is the feeling you get on a Sunday evening when you think about Monday morning and your work. We want our employees to come to work feeling excited and energized to make a difference. By involving them in shaping our culture, we are confident that we will create an innovative, motivating and high-performing Körber culture."
Gabriele Fanta
CHRO Körber Group
Our core values
Around 13,000 employees, more than 100 locations worldwide: The multitude of talents, experiences and nationalities are of inestimable value to us. The great challenge here is that all employees at all locations should identify with Körber, no matter how different their respective local cultures may be. We can only achieve this through our shared culture values: trust and collaboration.
In order to be successful in the long term, we ensure a common understanding of trustful collaboration. To make this a reality, we rely on the ideas and participation of all employees – regardless of their function, location or position. This not only increases employee commitment and satisfaction, but also forms the basis for the flexibility and productivity required in an increasingly complex world.
Trust
Trust is the glue that holds and connects teams together. A workplace where colleagues trust each other reduces anxiety and raises the quality of collaboration. This has a positive impact on communication, every project and ultimately the entire business. At Körber, we are therefore actively committed to ensuring that uncertainty and mistrust have no place in our work environment.
Collaboration
Constructive, trusting collaboration is an essential element for success – it brings people together productively, strengthens the sense of belonging, links knowledge and skills, breaks down silos and creates synergies. At Körber, we therefore attach great importance to mutual respect. We encourage the exchange of ideas. We talk openly and honestly about goals and expectations. We work together, not alone. This is how we make progress.
Our Culture Compass
In order to give our shared culture at Körber a clear framework, we have developed a guideline that serves as orientation for our behavior and our collaboration. It describes our shared cultural values – trust and collaboration – and offers instructions for self-reflection as well as joint exercises for the team. We call this guideline our Culture Compass, as it gives us orientation on the way to a common corporate culture.
Our way to a common culture
Our cultural journey at Körber began in 2022, and we are still on the way to a shared culture. Here you will find an overview of the individual activities and milestones that we have achieved together so far.
September 2022
Start of the culture project
The starting signal for our culture project was given at the Körber Leadership Meeting 2022, where our managers laid the foundation for the bottom-up approach, which focuses on the active participation of all employees.
January 2023
Culture Workshops
From January to August, a total of 20 culture workshops were held in eight countries with almost 500 employees. The central question was: What would you like the culture at Körber 2030 to be like? The answers were overwhelming: 1,860 post-its filled with ideas and wishes, of which trust and collaboration were the most frequently mentioned terms. They were therefore declared our two core values, which will guide all further activities.
September 2023
Culture roll-outs
All locations now have the opportunity to apply for in-depth culture roll-outs. These are supported by our internal culture experts and aim to consolidate the jointly defined culture values and develop site-specific activities.
January 2024
Culture Compass
Our guide to developing and implementing our corporate culture – the Culture Compass – was published (see Culture Compass). The Compass is supplemented by materials with exercises and tips for actively living our core values. Our Culture Habit Cards were also published in January 2024. They make Körber's corporate culture tangible and usable, and are intended to support our employees in their own personal development. Each card serves as inspiration and impulse for a new week. This way, we can learn to avoid time wasters, celebrate successes, take breaks, or ask for feedback. The cards help us establish small habits in our everyday working life that contribute to strengthening our culture.
February 2024
Podcast Culture Talks
The first episode of our internal podcast Culture Talks was published. In the podcast, our colleague and culture expert Laura Weil talks to various colleagues about a Culture Habit Card selected by the guest. This results in different thematic focuses. Anyone can take part, there is a new episode every month.
June 2024
Culture Coach Academy
In our first Culture Coach Academy, 20 employees from different countries and Business Areas were trained as culture experts from June to December. The coaches will next independently implement appropriate measures to strengthen our corporate culture at their locations.
October 2024
Culture roll-outs
In-depth culture workshops were held at six locations in Southeast Asia, Hungary, Portugal, Germany, and the USA as part of our culture roll-outs. Around 400 employees were integrated into this process, representing various locations with a total of around 2,500 employees. The culture workshops also took place at production sites. With this, we aim to incorporate even more perspectives into our ongoing cultural work.
December 2024
Leader Training
Over the course of the year, 500 managers developed their leadership skills in our leadership camps. The topic of culture is an important component of these training programs. This turns managers into multipliers who carry the core values of our culture into the teams and act as role models.
January 2025
Culture coaches
In 2025, the first class of culture coaches will run further culture roll-outs. Site-specific initiatives will be developed to implement the shared corporate culture locally in a targeted manner. The Culture Coach Academy remains an established format and will be continued – with a record number of 40 colleagues taking part and training to become culture coaches. This will bring the total to 60 locations with trained culture coaches in 2025, who will support the strengthening of a culture of trust and collaboration.
A few of our people
Inês Santos
Körber Campus, Porto (Portugal)
"For me, Körber is a place of creativity where everyone can freely develop while still working as a team."
Sarah Eberle
Körber Business Area Supply Chain, Bad Nauheim (Germany)
"I wanted a workplace where everyone is open to feedback and questions and everyone is willing to help. Körber is like that."
Rahul Kora
Körber Business Area Supply Chain, Mumbai (India)
"For me, Körber is a place where everyone feels proud to belong, valued, heard, and inspired to grow."
